Solo

Artist Elspeth Diederix (1971)

Title Solo

Year 2001

Material Colour photo

About the work The colourful focal point of this image is a yellow plastic cup. An everyday object that you wouldn’t normally pay much attention to. The cup is held by a person who seems to almost disappear into the darkness, or who is perhaps emerging from it. It imbues the image with something powerful, but also a sense of mystery. This effect is enhanced by the fact that the cup seems to radiate light. It is as if photographer Elspeth Diederix wanted to reveal the sublime hidden in the world around us – even in ordinary objects.

About the artist Elspeth Diederix is a photographer, but she initially studied painting and sculpture at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie (1990-1995). This background is evident in her photographs, which have an almost painterly quality. Leaving nothing to chance, Diederix meticulously plans the composition and use of colour in her photographs using drawings, models and test shots. She travelled all over the world during a period as an artist-in-residence at the Rijksakademie (1998-2000) and in the years that followed. Since 2009, she has aimed her lens mainly on nature and her own garden.

In the collection Acquired in 2003. Solo is the only work by Diederix in De Nederlandsche Bank’s collection. Since the 1990s, De Nederlandsche Bank has acquired a number of works by former artists-in-residence at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, including Meschac Gaba, Roy Villevoye and Cristina Lucas.